With the Optoma HD80's Cinema picture and Warm color-temperature presets selected, its grayscale tracked within approximately ±650 degrees kelvin of the 6,500-K standard from 20 to 100 IRE - below average performance. Adjustments to the red, green, and blue gain and bias settings in the User color-temperature menu yielded much improved ±250-K grayscale tracking from 30 to 100 IRE. Color-decoder tests showed -5% green error on both the HDMI and component-video inputs. Its red and blue primary-color points, meanwhile, all displayed a slight degree of oversaturation relative to the SMPTE HD specification.

Overscan - the amount of picture area cut off at the edges of the display - measured 0% for 1080i/p signals with the Overscan option turned off via both HDMI and component-video inputs. And the HD80 displayed 1080i/p and 720p test patterns cleanly and with full resolution via both connections. The projector was able to accept 1080p/24-format signals from Blu-ray Disc players, although Optoma says the HD80 displays them at a standard 60-Hz refresh rate. Screen uniformity was excellent, with no sign of tinting or uneven brightness visible on gray full-field test patterns. A high-def Silicon Optix HQV test disc showed the projector capable of reducing picture noise without eliminating detail, and it also passed that disc's video- and film-mode deinterlacing tests.

The HD80's post-calibration brightness proved adequate for dark-room viewing on an 87-inch-wide, 100-inch-diagonal screen. Turning on the projector's Brite lamp mode yielded much better brightness but also increased fan noise, which was already fairly high with Brite mode off. Optoma rates the HD80's lamp life at 3,000 hours. Best-case full-on/off contrast ratio that I measured was 2,717:1 with the manual Iris control set at 4 and the Image AI mode turned off - an excellent showing.